They're EVERYWHERE!

CH: 4/13 - Hiss

This isn't an attack or a bait, it's a barely organized retreat.

Hmmm, if grandma Whisper was the one who organized the hive after the return to the Badlands, this could be the final retreat.

Maybe-

Instincts honed by centuries of fighting and surviving assassination attempts immediately save her when, from the corner of her eye, she spots a changeling not fleeing in the same direction as the horde.

She spins in a pirouette, hooking the leg of the warrior charging at her with her foreleg and using the swing to lead its attack into an head-first crash with an infiltrator trying to take her from the other side.

A hive link above her makes her aware of the next incoming attack which she resolves by a simple blast of energy from her horn cutting the changeling's head off mid-flight.

More and more break off of the fleeing army, swarming Chrysalis who recognizes this as the classic 'throw insignificant changelings at the enemy to tire them out' tactic.

"ENOUGH!" she yells, sparking a shockwave of green power from her horn knocking the changelings away and leaving only one standing.

One as tall as herself, watching her with a smirk. Infiltrator, certainly, yet possessing a manner of bulky carapace suited for someone used to war rather than cloak and dagger operations. Her bright, blue eyes contrast sharply with her black mane tied into a ponytail and, despite the difference between the ages of the two queens, she does look older than Chrysalis, or at least more worn.

To her surprise, the other queen doesn't order a new wave of changelings to attack, instead simply waving her foreleg around to encompass the entire situation. As she does so, the noise of the army fades away and the entire picture goes blurry.

"Chrysalis, Chrysalis..." the queen shakes her head, "Does this look familiar?"

Oh yes. When the bastards betrayed me during the first invasion of Canterlot. When my changelings started getting massacred from behind by the loyalists of my 'generals'. When Celestia saw it and ordered a counterattack by the forces she protected inside the castle itself. And finally, when we faced the fury of the alicorn of the Sun backed into the corner.

We made that huge mistake ourselves. We cocooned and gathered Canterlot citizens in one place so she didn't have to restrain herself anymore in fear of killing them.

Chrysalis shudders and rubs a particular spot on her carapace. Of course, with enough love there are no actual lasting wounds for changelings, but the memory of the blistering heat as Celestia flew out of the castle in front of her guards...

Some lessons never disappear, only fade.

This isn't that first defeat in Canterlot, though.

"Considering that with every queen's shade I get rid of I uncover even more stupidity, I'm fairly certain that this is a sight most of us grew to know."

"HAH!" the other queen laughs and the world disappears, leaving only the two of them in the darkness of the hive mind, "Correct. This, young one-"

"I am literally centuries older than any other queen in history..." Chrysalis rolls her eyes.

"Oh fine," the queen waves her hoof dismissively, "Chrysalis, I am queen Hiss, and that memory," she grins again as she resumes her previous sentence, "Was our escape into the Badlands, the breakdown of the changeling territory, and the reason why we never should have had warrior queens in the first place."

"You're an infiltrator," comments Chrysalis dryly.

"Oh har har," Hiss rolls her eyes, "Of course I'm not talking about myself. I saved all those idiots running like hunted animals. Too bad all I got from that was a slit throat by my daughter Whisper whom I assume you've met already."